Plagiarism software tracks anti-Muslim bias

Since 9/11, groups using fear and anger to spread negative messages about Muslims have moved from the fringes of public discourse into the mainstream media, research shows.

Using plagiarism detection software, Christopher Bail, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, tracked the influence of 1,084 news releases about Muslims from 120 organizations on more than 50,000 television news program transcripts and newspaper articles aired or published from 2001 to 2008.